Tag Archives: Thoughts

FIVE WISE LINES [September 2025]

Posted on by
Reply

The aim of introduction is to conceal a person’s identity.

George Mikes, How To Be an Alien

From the beginning our philosophers have tried to teach us how to die,
and our poets have taught us that to contemplate death
is to learn to live.

Jonathan weiner, Long for this world

Nothing is harder to see into than people’s natures.

Zhuge liang [a.k.a. Kongming], The WAy of the General

To know how to eat is to know how to live.

Auguste Escoffier

Reality can be beaten with enough imagination.

Mark twain

PROMPT: Traveled from Home

Posted on by
Reply
Daily writing prompt
Share a story about the furthest you’ve ever traveled from home.
View all responses

”Home” and “away” lost all meaning long ago, becoming a false dichotomy. “Furthest” is likely presumed to mean the most distant in space, but that is not always the greatest mental distance. Sometimes a place changes while you were away, and that shift through time becomes the most jarring distance.

PROMPT: Habit

Posted on by
Reply
Daily writing prompt
What daily habit do you do that improves your quality of life?
View all responses

I poop. Surely, I would have exploded in my youth if I hadn’t developed the habit. I feel my quality of life as a human must be better than the quality of life of gut bacteria in wall-spattered fecal matter. At least I have the leisure and capacity to contemplate such things.

FIVE WISE LINES [August 2025]

Posted on by
Reply

Life has become immeasurably better
since I have been forced to stop taking it seriously.

Hunter s. Thompson

If asked the nature of cha no yu*
Say it’s the sound of wind blow pines
In a painting.

Sen Sotan

*”Tea ceremony” in Japanese.

All rivers flow to the ocean.
Flow and let others flow too.

Sri ramakrishna quoted by Will durant

He who makes a beast of himself
gets rid of the pain of being a man.

Samuel johnson

…The Edge… There is no honest way to explain it
because the only people who really know where it is
are the ones who have gone over.

Hunter s. Thompson, Hell’s Angels

PROMPT: 30 Things

Posted on by
Reply
Daily writing prompt
List 30 things that make you happy.
View all responses

1.) love; 2.) a glorious turn of phrase; 3.) discovery; 4.) walking; 5.) swimming; 6.) stumbling upon an interesting and / or novel idea; 7.) movement; 8.) travel; 9.) street food; 10.) quiet; 11.) health; 12.) recognition that when things are at their very worst, they must get better — because everything is impermanent; 13.) an intense stretch; 14.) Whitman’s “Leaves of Grass;” 15.) undiscovered country; 16.) the hanging moment; 17.) a mystery-laden world; 18.) a moment of flow; 19.) a mountain path; 20.) a clear stream; 21.) the way of non-adversariality; 22.) a thing stripped to its simplest form; 23.) the moment breath turns the tide; 24.) animals being animals; 25.) a brief instant of free fall; 26.) the recognition that something that used to cause me angst or fear no longer does; 27.) when body, movement, and the world fall into alignment; 28.) first contact with someplace / something new; 29.) connection; 30.) the first sign that the struggle is paying off.

PROMPT: Dinosaur

Posted on by
Reply
Daily writing prompt
If you could bring back one dinosaur, which one would it be?
View all responses

Do not make me bring Jeff Goldblum up in here. [No wonder they are still rebooting those movies every two years, people are not getting the message.]

PROMPT: 10 Things

Posted on by
Reply

List 10 things you know to be absolutely certain.

1.) Nothing is permanent.

2.) The world is not what it seems.

3.) One’s subjective experience is not determined by the state of the world.

4.) Nobody grasps enough truth to be intolerant.

5.) Uncertainty is the root of all fear.

6.) Fear is the root of all hatred.

7.) Hatred is a subjective experience (See #3.) Also, uncertainty is the root of all hatred (by the transitive property,) hence the benefit of travel.

8.) Any who: a.) has suffered a string of hardships; b.) allows themselves to believe that some “other” is wholly responsible for said hardships; and c.) who lacks a sufficient sense of self-empowerment to avoid surrendering entirely to a group identity can (and likely will) become a Nazi (or the equivalent of their day.)

9.) No one can predict the future. [Regardless of how much we all love to try. (See #5.)]

10.) Entropy increases (ultimately, in a closed system.)

NOTE: I remain ready to abandon any certainty in the face of better information.

PROMPT: Security or Adventure

Posted on by
1
Daily writing prompt
Are you seeking security or adventure?
View all responses

Not sure what to do with this one. It reads to me much as would, “Would you prefer air or water?”

Empty Chairs [Free Verse]

Posted on by
Reply 
I watch the chairs
   That watch the ocean,
 Wondering whether 
   Some passerby will take 
   A seat to admire
      The turquoise water
      & crashing surf.

No one does.

Tourist and local alike
   Spill by in a rush to get
   Through paradise to
   Somewhere else --
   Probably a cruddy
       Hotel room or
       Unloved job. 

Of course, if someone 
   Did take a seat,
   They might be run off
   On the grounds that
      These are proprietary
      Chairs.

[That's just the petty world
   In which we live;
      Where a business will
      Protect its space for 
      Exclusive use by 
      Nonexistent customers.]

One might suggest that
   It's too hot to sit 
   And admire the ocean,

But by the time those chairs
   Have cooled,
   The view will be 
      Blackness.

On Tourists & Travelers [Free Verse]

Posted on by
Reply 
A tourist looks back fondly upon 
      A favorite destination;
 A traveler is always at it. 

A tourist loathes travel hiccups;
 A traveler calls them stories.

A tourist jumps from one
      Postcard vista to the next;
 A traveler moves through the world.

A tourist collects knicknacks & geegaws;
 A traveler collects experiences.

A tourist, between sights, seeks
      A life experience as close to 
      Their homelife as possible.
 A traveler wants a life experience
      As close to local as possible.

A tourist has a favorite meal;
 A traveler assumes he hasn't
      Crossed paths with it yet.

A tourist leaves nothing to chance;
 A traveler embraces the spontaneous.

A tourist takes comfort as a main course;
 A traveler uses it like a condiment.